Simple
by VegaLume-San
Summary: One of my goals for this was to hide the pairing until the very end. Kinda sappy angsty. I'm rather proud of this one. I hope you like it. death fic Light citrus - lime


September 1st, 2006 (i don't procrastinate do i?)

Title: Simple

Author: Vega-Lume

Pairing: 1x2x1

Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing, if I did it would only be available in OAV's. (Mawahahaha!!)

Warning: Angst, citrus, (kinda limeish), Death, POV, yaoi,

A/N: Warning, there is a Major Character death in this fic, he is already dead. Also I have tried very hard to hide who has died until the end of the fic. I hope I have succeeded.

Word count: story text only 2,235, total text, including all notes 2,468

Forethought – The written word is all that stands between memory and oblivion.

Without books as our anchors, we are cast adrift, neither teaching nor learning.

They are windows on the past, mirrors on the present and prisms reflecting all possible futures.

Books are lighthouses erected in the dark sea of time. – Gargoyles, A Lighthouse in the Sea of Time .

Simple

By Vel

He never liked wearing neckties, funny that that is the first thing I thought of when I saw him that last time.

He lay there, a serene look upon his face, none of the weariness that had plagued him for so very long. He had never been completely well, not sense that last battle, he tried to hide it at first, especially from Quatre, we could all see the look of pain that would flit across the blonde's delicate features every time they crossed paths.

He left shortly after the Merimea incident, he never said why but I knew.

Three years went by before our paths crossed again. I was surprised; he had been so near to us in the past years yet we never noticed him, and we all came and went, never really looking at the world around us.

He did not take the money the government offered him, nor did he use the funds from Oz that had been invaluable to us during the war. At first when I discovered that the poor young man working in that shabby diner, was my dear friend. I simply watched him, I knew without a doubt that I needed to help him, but the trick was how to go about it. He did not take charity lightly.

When I had finally made up my mind on how to help, I went to him, only to find that he was gone. I was relieved to find that he had only just left and was still in sight. I had started to jog so I could catch up to him but I was stopped by something that shocked me even more then the state that I had found him in.

He had stopped at a bus stop, just as a school bus was letting the children off. A young girl around the age of five or six jumped from the bus and threw her arms around his neck. I continued to stand there in shock, as they waked past me the girl now perched upon my friends' shoulders.

He had only gone a few feet before he turned back and said to me. "Come on or are you just going to stand there gapping like a fish."

A million words flooded my mind, yet I found myself mute. I simply followed his lead in silence.

We did not go to his home right away, first he stopped at a small market where with the help of the young girl the picked out something for supper. I saw a look of worry on is face when he heard the total from his purchase, yet he seemed to shrug it away, gathering up the bags and the little girl's hand.

I continued to follow, knowing that he did want me here, even if he did seem to ignore the fact that I was there.

We arrived in a small apartment building, and climbed three flights of stairs before stopping at the door of what I could only assume was his home.

Once inside, I watched as he crouched down and said something to the girl, before rising and disappearing into another room.

"Hello," she said, tucking back a shock of bright red hair behind her left ear, "daddy said that you're a friend and that I am s'possed to be polite till he gets back."

"He's your daddy?" I asked.

She nodded, blinking her gray eyes "uh huh, he found'ed and brought me here when I was real small." A proud smile spread across her small face showing the gap where her two front teeth had been and dimpling her freckled cheeks. "He even named me."

I had to smile at her, "What did he name you?"

"My names Helen, Helen Ophilia…" before she could continue her father came back.

"Lily? Are you being good?"

"Uh huh!"

"Good, supper is almost ready, go wash up."

During the meal I learned that Helen, Or Lily as she preferred to be called had be staying with him for nearly the entire three years that he had been gone. He had found her abandoned on the street at around age two. No one knew of her family or background. So he took her in, at first as a foster parent then he adopted her just last year.

I also learned that he had tapped Oz's funds and was using very small amounts to help with living expenses; he had also stashed away a very tidy sum, to go towards Lily's education.

He told me that if the adoption agency learned of the funds the would take her away and most likely put him in jail, so he had to be careful with how much he used, and also had to have a legitimate job. In this town, good jobs were hard to come by. And I know that the problem that he had had when that war ended would prevent him from using his skills.

The job at the diner was all that he could get, so their housing was chosen by the amount the diner brought in, though it was not ideal for raising children it could have been worse.

While Lily was washing up for bed, and I was helping tidy up after supper, I finally gained the courage that I had been lacking all evening.

"Why don't you come and live with me?"

"What?" I think I startled him.

"I mean it. I don't live with Quatre and the others any more, I have had my own place for years now."

"I don't…"

"Hear me out, I live just a few blocks form here. A nice big three-bedroom loft, you can still work and take Lily to the bus stop and…"

I did not get a chance to finish, for her threw his arms around me and was squeezing me so tight I could barely breath.

It took only a few weeks to sort out his apartment, and in the mean time; I was looking for mine. I did not have the heart to tell him that my apartment wasn't really much bigger then his. I got lucky, and found the ideal place a mere four blocks from his apartment. A huge three-bedroom two-bath loft that took up the entire top floor of a sixteen story building, not only did we have a stunning view of the park next door, but we also owned the roof as well.

I spent the last few days before they were to move in, making the place seem liked I had lived there for a while, as well as making the roof up into a backyard of sorts. There had already been a high fence around the roof, with a gate that led to the fire escape. So I hired some men to landscape the roof, that work cost almost as much as buying the apartment did, but it was more then worth it in the end.

They moved in exactly one month after I asked them to share a home with me, they had been ready before then, but I wasn't. I told him that the smaller of the two rooms had been used as a office and was not fit to live in, then with my job I was finding it hard to find the time to clean it out. He accepted my excuse and if he knew that it was a lie, he didn't let on.

I was surprised by how easily we became a family.

We had only been living together for a few months at the time; I was sitting at the kitchen table helping Lily with her homework. He was at the sink washing up the dinner dishes. And I could not help but feel that this was so very right. I had never truly realized how much I had missed him until that very moment.

Later that night long after Lily had brushed her teeth, had her bedtime story and received her goodnight kisses, I went to him.

He welcomed me with open arms, and gentle kisses. That first time was gentle and warm and so full of love that it nearly made me weep. I took him and loved him in a leisurely pace that left him moaning beneath me, and when he found him completion, a look of pure ecstasy graced his beautiful face. The soft sated look in his eyes was what compelled me to join him in his haze.

I woke alone the next morning as was a bit disappointed until I noticed the time, it was the time that he took Lily to the bus stop each school day.

When he arrived home twenty minutes later we had a talk; I told him that I only just moved in here myself and that I had purchased this home for them. He smiled and said, "I know" then I told him that I loved him with all my being and he said, "I know that too" when I asked if he would marry me, he simply said. "Yes"

When we sat Lily down that night at supper and explained to her that new changes she was pleased then asked how long until she could have a little brother.

We were married a year later, I was so happy with my new life that I could easily ignore all the little things that threatened to destroy my world. While Lily and I thrived in our new happy home, he seemed to fade.

Even after our new four-year-old son Gideon Tobias joined our family, his job, his help and with the children and housework seemed to tire him easily. We had been married a year when I finally convinced him to quit his job at the diner.

Gideon with his messy brown hair a hazel eyes was just starting school by the time Lily had her ninth birthday and I could no longer ignore the changes that were taking place. He seemed so frail now; he hardly ate and has started taking naps throughout the day.

I hired a house keeper to tidy up our home and keep him company while I was at work, and it seemed to help, he had more energy when the children came home and was able to join in the family activities each evening.

Things went quite well for many years and though the frailty never seemed to fade completely, he was a master of masks, he hid his ailment very well, and I am ashamed that he was even able to hide it from me.

Lily was just starting her last year of high school when the inevitable happened. I had taken a holiday from work so Maddy, our house keeper could have a few extra days to spend with her family.

He insisted that because it was my holiday that I should relax, and let him take care of everything. I agreed and I still regret it to this day.

I stayed home as he left to drive fourteen year old Gideon to school. Then when he came home I sat there and watched as he moved about our home doing odd jobs. I didn't help when noon rolled around and it was time for lunch then afterwards I watched as he took our third child a blue eyed brunette girl we named Cameron Elizabeth, who was barely three at the time into the bed-room for her nap. I watched as he started to wash the dishes from lunch and watched as he collapsed on the kitchen floor.

His liver had been damaged while he had been bounced around his Gundam near the end of the war and for the past fifteen years his weak liver had been trying to filter his blood with little success. The toxins in his body had been building up to the point that there was now very little chance of survival.

When I asked if there was anything that could be done, the doctor, an older gentleman with a kind face shook his head no. The only option to us would be a liver transplant, but with how weak his liver was there was no way he could survive.

When I told him, he simply said, "Take me home" I did.

To his doctors surprise he managed to survive for nearly a year, and though he could barely walk on his own he was there to see our beautiful Lily receive her Diploma.

He died less then a week later, quietly in his sleep with me by his side. I knew that that night would be our last. I made love to him in the same soft and gentle way as our first time had been. When we were through, he turned to me with a soft smile on his lips.

I asked, "Why are you smiling like that?" I had never seen that smile before; it was as if he had found peace within himself.

His eyes closed just before he simply said, "I love you." We had been a couple for thirteen years, married for twelve. That was the first and only time he ever said that to me.

I waited until he was asleep; before I let my tears fall. When he became still in my arms I held him close to my heart and said softly. "I love to too, Heero"

Owari


End file.
